Don’t Force Shabby Chic

I spent the entire weekend working on the dining room.  I am completely whipped - knuckles are swollen, back is aching, but I got a lot accomplished!
I had to make some tough decisions about the dining room.  No matter how many Shabby Chic slipcovers I made ( and, I did get one wing chair slip made…succesfully, I might add!)  – no matter how many things I painted white-  no matter how much I begged G-Man to let me paint the cherry furniture- no matter how much I wanted to deformalize…My dining room just needed to be what it needed to be.  And, that is a formal dining room.  It knows that we have a casual breakfast room and an island in the kitchen with an eating bar.  It knew that it’s function was meant to be formal. 
The dining room and family finally convinced me that I didn’t’ need to force a style at Blue Creek Home just because I love the look. I have successfully introduced a little pale, romantic, shabby into other rooms, but the D.R. wouldn’t have any part of it!
So, here is what is happening in the dining room now:
* Repainted the whole room including the damask stenciled wall in Benjamin Moore HC # 45
* Removed a couple of “eye candy only items” and replaced them with pretty workhorse/storage
* Ditched the linen cream slipcovered matching wing chair idea and used a single chair from another room
* Changed out/ moved around most of the accessories
* Worked with the pretty antique rug and silk curtains that are in there now

Love this rug – the center is mainly school house red

The border had several shades of blue and the red fades to a muted coral shade

These silk curtains are one of my favorite things

A good friend in Jackson who owned a “Curtain Exchange” store

made these gorgeous silk curtains for me before we left MS

I will love them forever!

They are also the reason that Alex kept saying,

“Mom, you can’t keep these silk, ball gown curtains and

expect the room to become Shabby Chic with white slipcovers.”

She was right!!! 

So, it is coming together quickly now that I know where I am going with it. 

Confucius say:  “Don’t try to force Shabby Chic!”   Actually, he didn’t say that.

He did say:  “When it is obvious that the goals cannot be reached, don't adjust the goals, adjust the action steps.”

Once I did that, everything fell into place and I will be posting the dining room reveal very soon!

Rhonda